


The Seven Cardinal Virtues Of Captain Jack Harkness.

by The9thDoctor



Series: Jack's Story. [3]
Category: Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Torchwood
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-31
Updated: 2011-10-31
Packaged: 2017-10-25 03:01:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,168
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/271011
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/The9thDoctor/pseuds/The9thDoctor
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Jack puts his lessons into practice...</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Seven Cardinal Virtues Of Captain Jack Harkness.

**Author's Note:**

> This is the third part of a loosely connected series written about Jack - I can't urge you enough to read the first two parts, especially because this part will make a lot more sense, but mainly because the second part is probably my favorite things that I've written... :)

The Seven Cardinal Virtues of Captain Jack Harkness.

Or,

Everything Jack knows, he learnt from the Doctor.

 

 

 

1.Chastity

 

It had been far too long since Jack had taken on a Weevil on his own, and he was shamefully out of practice. The creature almost had him pinned down, unable to reach his gun or the tranquilliser. 

 

Jack would later tell himself that he was just drawing his strength together in readiness to throw the Weevil off, when from out of the blue a branch thumped down and the Weevil turned away from Jack growling at the newcomer. Jack leapt to his feet, mentally calculating how much Retcon he had in his pocket, and how he would be able to cover up the corpse. A bloody have-a-go hero roaming the park... It was the sort of thing that would only happen to him.

 

Jack pushed all that to one side, throwing himself into capturing the Weevil before it ripped either the other man or himself apart.

 

Finally the Weevil lay subdued on the grass, a bag over its head. Jack tried to think of a decent explanation, wondering exactly how much the man had seen. He turned.

 

His would-be rescuer was leaning up against a tree, and straightened up as soon as Jack stood. Jack felt his stomach drop away and he had to sternly remind himself that openly drooling would probably be frowned upon. This, after all, was not the right moment, place or Century to proposition strangers.

 

The man was much, much younger than he would have thought. Barely into his twenties, Jack guessed. There was a smear of darkening blood making its way down his temple and the distant streetlights reflected off the studded belt he was wearing. Jack felt a long-forgotten shiver of lust pooling in his stomach. It had been so long.

 

Jack concentrated very, very hard. The hunt always got his adrenaline flowing, and in times gone by, or maybe that should be times gone forward, the boy would be on his back quicker than he would be able to blink. Jack needed to remain professional. The boy didn't look like the sort of person who would easily swallow the old 'carnival mask' excuse.

 

The boy moved and spoke, and Jack bit down on the flare of desperate attraction rising again in his gut. He couldn't do this. Not here, not with an unconscious Weevil a few foot away, not with this boy who knew more than he ever should.

 

Jack turned away and picked the Weevil up, throwing it over his shoulder and trying to control the spike in his breathing that the boy's smile had caused.

He wouldn't do anything.

 

Even when the boy said three words that could have been scientifically designed to redirect all of Jack's blood flow to his cock, Jack knew he couldn't.

 

It was for the best, after all.

 

 

 

2.Charity

 

Jack had all-but convinced himself that it was for the best. Ianto had survived the battle of Canary Wharf, he must have lost everything, and now he was trying to find a way back in. Jack watched Ianto waiting outside the deserted tourist office on the CCTV and fingered the box of retcon pills on his desk. He could easily take him to the nearby cafe and slip one in his coffee. It would have been helping him out, Jack knew that, but he still couldn't do it. Maybe not ever.

 

It wasn't as though he was going anywhere important when Ianto had stepped out in front of the SUV and Jack threatened to run him over, and there was nothing going on that Tosh, Owen and Suzie couldn't have easily dealt with on their own. It had been a busy day but fortunately everything seemed to be contained now, just reports to write, cleanup to be done, and the bay to dredge for the remains of the alien.

 

The pterodactyl was an interesting touch, and Jack realised that anyone who could track down one and keep it contained long enough to find help while wearing a particularly interesting suit, probably deserved an impromptu interview at the very least.

 

It was all Jack could do, really, he'd never really been able to resist a cute boy with a dinosaur and he did have that big syringe in the back of the car...

He was just helping him out, that was all.

 

Being dropped on an attractive young Welshman by an not-at-all extinct pterosaur was, depressingly in hindsight, one of the high points of Jack's month.

 

And then they had laid there.

 

Jack had lived through enough to know that 21st Century men, no matter how open-minded, didn't tend to breathe quite so deeply into another man's mouth for so long without there being something behind it. Hell, even in the 51st Century, Jack wouldn't have put up with it for long if it had been someone repellent. Ianto, therefore, didn't find him repellent. It was a point of view that Jack found himself sharing.

 

Later, when he admitted that he had just given a job to a Torchwood One survivor, despite all he had said since the news of the battle of Canary Wharf had reached Cardiff. Suzie had just sighed, and asked him what colour their eyes had been.

 

Jack looked at her for a moment. Suzie had always been able to read him better than either Tosh or Owen.

 

Finally, he shook his head. It was just a job, he said. Jack was just helping him out. It was the least he could do.

 

 

 

3.Dilligence

 

Jack worked hard at Torchwood, but Ianto worked miracles.

 

He had the archives organised, had the Hub spotless, Jack's shirts clean and ironed, the third button on his greatcoat sewn back on and the ancient coffee machine dusted off, all in less than a month.

 

Jack couldn't quite remember what any of them had done without him. Especially what he had done during boring meetings without having a certain young man flitting in and out of the room and bending over in such a way that had Jack rock hard and imagining throwing Ianto over his desk. It made working for Torchwood interesting in a way that Jack hadn't known since Greg had died.

 

In response to Ianto's work, Jack found himself concentrating harder on the job at hand more than he ever had before. He started to throw himself into Weevil hunting, his own investigations, anything that kept him away from the Hub and the silent, well dressed figure of Ianto.

 

Jack could usually sublimate his attraction to people if he wanted to – not that it happened very often – but with Ianto, he found his iron control slipping.

 

Once he realised that Ianto was a special case, he worked even harder, this time concentrating his efforts on the charm and flirtation that had served him so well during his conman days.

 

Ianto seemed to ignore all of it.

 

Jack complimented his organisational skills, his work keeping the Hub free of out-of-date newspapers and pizza boxes, his dedication to Jack's wardrobe and praised his coffee to all and sundry.

 

Nothing made the slightest bit of difference besides a small smile and a 'Thank you, sir'.

 

Jack tried harder. He unbuttoned his shirts when they were alone together in the Hub at night. He found excuses to touch Ianto, which became less and less plausible over time.

 

Mostly, Ianto went an interesting bright red colour and stammered out something that was halfway between an apology and an excuse, but Jack never let it defeat him. He had a job to do, after all.

 

Then, one evening, Jack followed him down into the archives with the express intention of surprising Ianto and pulling him into a darkened corner not covered by the CCTV camera to make suggestive remarks regarding the cut of his trousers. Ianto had sagged in the circle of Jack's arms and gave in.

 

Jack's hard work paid off eventually. It always did, he thought smugly as he pressed Ianto down onto his camp bed. He usually got what he aimed for.

 

 

 

4.Temperance

 

After Jack had carefully put the three bodies into the morgue – Owen wouldn't need to perform an autopsy, after all - he sunk onto the couch and stared down at his hands. He'd washed them, but he could still see the blood in his minds eye.

 

Strangely, that didn't bother him as much as curling of his finger as though pulling an invisible trigger.

 

Would he have shot Ianto? Could he?

 

Jack clenched his fists tightly, pushing himself back to his feet. He couldn't sit around and feel sorry for himself. There was too much left to do.

 

Ianto was exactly where he had left him, slumped up against one of the corners of the tiny room, still dominated by the conversion unit. He had dragged his knees up to his chest and was eyeing the horrendous pool of blood staining the concrete floor with such dead-looking eyes that they made Jack's fingers curl up again, only this time he wasn't pulling the trigger of a pistol. They itched to reach out to Ianto, to comfort him, to forgive him, to tell him that one day this would hurt less, but Jack kept his hands firmly in his pockets.

 

Everything was such a big fucking mess that Jack was sorely tempted to curl into himself next to Ianto and try to retreat into his own head as successfully as the young Welshman seemed to have managed. He took a deep breath. It sounded loud in the room, and Ianto flinched.

 

Jack shut his eyes briefly. There would be no shouting, he told himself, not from him at least and not now. He would hold onto it all – the rage, the disappointment, the empty feeling of betrayal and the deep, bone numbing sadness of it all – and work it all out later when Ianto wasn't around to bear the brunt of an attack that would probably shatter him into a thousand sharp-edged pieces without hope of recovery. Jack had too many years experience at pushing his feelings away and keeping a tight grip on his control. It wouldn't fail him now, Jack wouldn't let it, not even as Ianto blinks up at him from his place on the cold concrete floor and asks brokenly if Jack would let him die on his feet rather than his knees.

 

Jack shivers at the sound of the Welshman's voice and slowly, deliberately, pulls out his pistol. Ianto sags, shoulders slumping. Jack throws the gun across the room. It lands at the foot of the conversion unit with a crash. Ianto looks up at him.

 

Jack holds his hand out. He can remain calm. He has to.

 

It's all a matter of control, and Jack has had oh-so-much practice at that.

 

 

 

5.Kindness

 

Owen has taken Gwen home and Tosh flagged down a taxi a couple of minutes ago. Jack hopes they'll be okay, but he knows that today will take a lot of getting over.

 

He pulls the SUV finally, thankfully, into the parking bay and glances into the back seat. Ianto is asleep. He has been since he silently accepted the painkillers from the paramedics back at the village that Jack knows will be added to the ever increasing list of nightmares locked away in his subconscious.

 

Tosh had told Jack everything she knew about Ianto's time with the cannibals, but there was an awful amount of time not accounted for, and Jack's imagination had been working overtime to fill in the gaps.

 

He looked too young, curled in on himself, fingers gripping tightly at the edge of Jack's greatcoat. Too young. They were all too young, and Jack knew there was only so much he could do. He couldn't save them. Not forever.

 

Ianto didn't wake up as Jack pulled him out of the car and carried him downstairs to the Hub. Didn't even move when Jack laid him down on the couch and pulled a ratty blanket over him

 

Jack sat down on the coffee table, staring down at the young man. Ever since... Well, for the last few weeks he'd be so quiet. More than Jack would have thought possible, but he had always been there – passing Jack paperwork, coffee and his coat all with the same look in his eyes that made Jack wonder if he was apologising.

 

Jack reached out gently and smoothed the dark hair back from Ianto's forehead. Save for the slow, comforting rise and fall of his chest, Ianto remained perfectly still.

 

Jack moved his hand again, unwilling to take his eyes off him for a moment.

 

When Ianto finally moved, moaning slightly as his eyes flickered open, Jack had lost track of time. He didn't know how long he'd sat there beside Ianto, running his fingers through his hair and trying to banish images of Ianto in the hands of the cannibals – gagged on his knees, blood running, dead from a slit throat, those beautiful eyes blank and glassy. The touch to Ianto's forehead was grounding him, convincing Jack that his team was safe, that Ianto was safe.

 

Jack smiled down weakly at him, hand still moving, reluctant to break the contact.

 

Nothing was said.

 

Nothing needed to be.

 

 

 

6.Patience

 

In the weeks that followed their near-disaster, Jack watched Ianto more than ever. Before, back when Ianto was either an amusing and attractive diversion to an untouched mound of paperwork, or a possible time bomb of rage and revenge, Jack had felt guilty about following him around the Hub with the CCTV or constantly glancing out of his office window.

 

It was different now. Jack watched Ianto for a sign. Any sign.

 

A sign that he was forgiven. A sign that he was waiting for Jack to return.

 

Ianto passed him his paperwork, made him his coffee and handed him his coat. There wasn't a sign.

 

There was nothing Jack could do except wait. This couldn't be hurried. Ianto wouldn't be swayed by any of Jack's charm and innuendo, and Jack wondered painfully if Ianto ever had been. Was there ever anything between them apart from lies?

 

Jack made sure he was noticed. There was no way Ianto could miss the way the cameras followed him around the building, the looks Jack shot him from the walkways as he made coffee, or the way the SUV was always parked in the street opposite his flat on long dark nights, but despite it all, Ianto said nothing. Not even to tell Jack 'no'.

 

Jack waited. It was all he could do. Like most things since he had watched the Doctor leave him all those thousands of years in the future, Jack was horribly good at waiting. He had a lot of things to wait for and depressingly few of them would be good.

 

There was nothing Jack could say. He had no words that would fix anything, nothing that would help them save for 'please', and that would break both of them in some indefinable way with no hope of an ending.

 

Weeks went by, full of paperwork, and aliens, and watching and long, long moments of waiting.

 

Suzie came back to life, and Gwen almost died and Jack watched Ianto fill in the forms, separated by the corpse of a woman Jack had once called a friend.

 

Everything happened in split seconds that were spaced too far apart.

 

Ianto raised an eyebrow as he spoke, the pieces slotting into place as Jack smiled around the thought that maybe, just maybe, Ianto had been waiting too.

 

And after all the practice Jack's had over the last century and a half, another ten minutes wouldn't kill him.

 

Ianto walked into his office precisely nine minutes and fifty-seven seconds later, stepping towards Jack and dropping the stopwatch, still ticking away, on Jack's desk.

 

Jack let out a long breath and finally stopped waiting. Everything, he knew now, would happen in time.

 

 

 

7.Humility

 

Jack apologised to them individually in the days after John vanished through the Rift and they holed up in a large suite with expensive wine and cheap pizza.

 

He took Owen out for a drink and they both got so thoroughly pissed that they staggered out of the last bar, arms wrapped round each other's shoulders and laughing like old times.

 

He bought Tosh presents, small things, meaningless to anyone else – small pieces of tech, flowers, a beautiful silk scarf. He wasn't buying his way back into her life, they both knew that. It was special, making her feel wanted.

 

Gwen was easy as well, a long talk in his office about how bloody proud he was of her. A pep-talk of epic proportions, leaving her to walk out with a massive, brilliant smile on her face. Jack made sure he made her feel like she could rule the world.

 

Ianto though... Ianto, as always, was different. He didn't yell, or ask what had happened, or where Jack had been. Ianto said nothing, just calmly told him it was good to have Jack back. It froze, and 

Jack knew there wasn't enough whiskey, or gifts, or carefully measured words that would make Ianto forgive him, not totally.

 

Screwing up his courage, he had asked Ianto on a date. A real date, not just a night spread out on the back seat of the SUV avoiding Weevils. A date with wine, and a meal and a movie. A date where Jack called round Ianto's flat for him wearing his best suit

 

Ianto had raised an eyebrow as he answered the door, glancing down at Jack's outfit. Jack had just smiled and offered Ianto his arm.

 

Later, back home, comfortably full of pasta and Merlot, Jack poured a measure of scotch and handed it to the young man sitting on the couch in front of him with his waistcoat and tie undone and bare feet tucked up under him.

 

Jack didn't think Ianto had ever looked more beautiful, but didn't have the faintest idea if that would make his job easier or harder. He knocked back his drink in one rasping swallow, setting the lead glass tumbler on the table and reaching over to grip Ianto's hand in his own.

 

Jack was sorry. Sorry for everything he had done and everything that had never happened.

 

Ianto didn't move, just sat still as a statue, listening to Jack finally being able to beg for forgiveness.

 

Jack didn't think he deserved it, but he wasn't willing to let Ianto go without a fight. He hadn't on the Valiant, and he was damned if he was going to let it happen now.

 

Finally, as Jack buried his face in his hands and trembled, Ianto held him tight, whispering words into Jack's ear that he had begged for.

 

The Doctor had taught Jack how to be human, but Ianto was a better person than Jack could ever hope to be.

  



End file.
